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Friday, April 27, 2012

FEELING DOWN? YOU MIGHT BE SUFFERING FROM CAPITALISM

THE PLAN TO OCCUPY MAY 1st

Temecula, CA – Spring is in the air and so is the Occupy Movement. On November 15, 2011, Occupy LA’s General Assembly consented
to planning for a May 1st People’s
General Strike. For the effective mobilization of Los Angeles communities,
the General Strike Preparation Committee broke into four separate winds of
‘caravans’ – North, South, East, and West - each with their own distinct and
mixed cultures and economics, converging at Pershing Square, downtown Los
Angeles.

For May 1st, 2012 Occupy
Los Angeles is organizing around a “4 Winds” People’s Power Car and Bike
Caravan through the urban sprawl of Los Angeles that will culminate in direct action
in and around the Financial District of downtown LA. People from all sectors of
the city will have a chance to plug in to the routes from any corner of the city,
helping to shut down the flow of capital while addressing the 99%’s major grievances or issues, which
are: HOUSING & EDUCATION as HUMAN RIGHTS, LGBTQ RIGHTS, END THE POLICE
STATE, ECONOMIC JUSTICE, and IM/MIGRANT RIGHTS.

These 4 caravans, beginning in the morning, coming from the
North, South, East & West, will be an amalgam of cars and bikes, Occupiers
and unions, community organizations and organic communities — taking over our streets on routes designed to bring
to light to society’s ills, past and present, engaging with residents and
workers as we connect the disparate voices, races, classes and nationalities
that make up Los Angeles. The caravans will stop at flashpoints along the way.
Flash occupations, food giveaways, and other direct actions targeting the foreclosure crisis and police brutality will be undertaken at
these flashpoints on our slow, city-paralyzing, carnival-esque descent into the
center of the city.

The convergence point at 6th & Main streets, at 2:30
PM, will have the People’sPrint Lab, the Welcome Tent, the Wellness
Tent, and will be focused on shining light on LA’s homeless issues, feeding
the people of Skid Row and raising awareness of social and economic inequality,
including the brutally ineffective Safer Cities Initiative that criminalizes
the homeless population while doing absolutely nothing to change the systemic
problems that make LA the homeless capital of the country. At 3 PM, we will
mobilize direct actions in the financial district of downtown LA. Now let’s
look at the four Winds and where they will be blowing in from, and remember to BRING AN EXTRA CASE OF WATER TO THE STRIKE:.

The West Wind is
a caravan from the Pacific Ocean to
the center of downtown LA, highlighting the lack of effective public
transportation between downtown and the coast, making travel times for the
working poor who commute between the two unfathomable. The 1st flashpoint will
be targeting the VAs misguided use of the land surrounding the center, land
that was initially set aside
for use as residences for homeless
veterans, while allowing students at UCLA
to join the caravan in protest of tuition hikes
and other cutbacks to education.
Continuing west on Wilshire into BeverlyHills, the 2nd flashpoint, on Rodeo Drive, highlights the
obliviousness of the 1% regarding
the struggles of the 99% with a “Let them eat cupcakes!” direct
action right in the 1%’s backyard. Occupy LA’s Queer Affinity Group and
OccupyFights Foreclosures will join the caravan from the Bank of America action at the 3rd flashpoint at Wilshire and LaBrea
— after highlighting the current foreclosure crisis and busting the myth of the
“affluent gay,” before continuing on to MacArthur
Park, the scene of the infamous May Day Melee in 2007, where the LAPD fired less-lethal ammunition indiscriminately
into crowds, injuring children, mothers
and journalists during the annual May 1st march for immigrant rights. Then we
take to our streets on foot, marching to the convergence.

The South Wind
travels though pockets of middle class neighborhoods, surrounded by vast,
impoverished areas which have sometimes been compared to Soweto: a racially
segregated township which has seen decades of brutal and violent state
repression and economic neglect.

On May 1st, 2012, by declaring a People’s General Strike,
all the communities of South LA in conjunction with Occupy LA, will peacefully
and proudly reclaim their community from the oppressive, and exploitative rule
of the 1%. To achieve this goal, the South Wind is reaching out to immigrants,
The Black Riders Liberation Party, Black and White clergy, the Interfaith
community, The Black Panthers, The Black Employees Association, the black
lesbian group, Here to Stay Coalition, the South Central Neighborhood Council,
the South Central farmers, South East Workers Alliance, The Youth Justice
Coalition, The Nation of Islam and other organizations in the neighborhood.

The South Wind
recalls the words of the prominent pastor and theologian, Reverend Dr. Lewis E
Logan II, at the General Assembly of Occupy
LA, who said the clergy have “a moral obligation notonly to speak on the
pulpit, but to be actively engaged in
the campaign for the empowerment of the less privileged in the tradition of Dr. Martin Luther King.”

The intention is to travel in solidarity along Los Angeles’ Central Avenue, with its historic and
inspiring milestones in the struggle for civil and human rights in America. Gathering
at 10 AM at Cal State University Dominguez Hills (you’ll spot us circling the
campus caravan style), a purportedly public university which, like every
college in the United States in 2012, imposes punitive fees on students which
deprive the working poor of their human right to an education. The South Wind People’s Power Bike &
Car Caravan will set off at 10:30 AM to make its way through Compton &
Watts.

The first flashpoint will be at 112th Street, The Maxine
Waters Employment Preparation Center — one of the adult education facilities
threatened with being shut down by the LAUSD school board and superintendent. As
the rich in this country continue to grow richer, one of the most impoverished
neighborhoods in California is being told that adult education will be taken
away from the community, because it is not ‘profitable’. Continuing on just a
few blocks we’ll be making another stop, our second flashpoint, at Ted Watkins
Park on 103rd and Central — a community gathering spot and adjacent to public
housing which is scheduled for privatization.

Our caravan of vehicles will continue to move along Central
Avenue through Compton and Watts, the community in which The Black Riders
Liberation Party have been organizing and forging truces between gangs of
warring factions for nearly twenty years. A slow-driving and biking 5 miles
later we’ll pull off at 41st and Central to honor some of the survivors from
the original LA chapter of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. We will
honor our sisters and brothers who were ambushed by the LAPD in December 1969,
and had to defend themselves from a brutal and unprovoked attack. Since 2007
alone, over200 people, the majority of which are people of color, have been
killed by the LAPD and LA County Sheriffs. We will also honor some of those who
have passed, such as Geronimo Ji-Jaga and Sister Somayah (who was also
subsequently a leader of the medical marijuana movement as part of her natural
herbal healing for the effects of sickle-cell anemia).

Our last flashpoint will be in vicinity of LA Trade
Technical College (community college district) and Abram Friedman Occupational
Center — to defend community colleges against cutbacks, fee increases
and tendencies towards privatization, and defend adult schools and regional
occupational centers for adults — again visiting the lack of educational
opportunities available today. We park our cars here and march past the Staples
Center to the convergence.

RISE-UP LA, an
action oriented group of youth fighting the Prison Industrial Complex, is
holding a march that meets up with the South Wind Caravan at 41st &
Central. They will be mobilizing between 9-10 AM at the corner of Florence
& Normandie, commemorating the beginning of the LA Rebellion, 20 years and 2 days after it broke out after Rodney
King’s attackers were acquitted. The march will begin at 10 AM, traveling down
Florence to Central, where it will join the South Wind and continue on into downtown.

The South Wind
makes several stops along the route, all with an emphasis on the need for
economic emancipation and racial justice in this oft neglected and ignored
majority black and brown community. Our brothers and sisters there that day
have tirelessly served despite the penalties this has brought upon them from
the system.

Our unprecedented show of solidarity on this May 1st General Strike – as people of
color, activists, clergy, youth, community organizers, community members, become
brothers and sisters united in struggle – we accept that our unity will be perceived as threatening to the
state apparatus who wish to silence us. Knowing this, in addition to being
accompanied and monitored by journalists from different parts of the world, the
South Wind has assembled a team of
local and international legal/human rights observers.
For one day, May 1st 2012, we disparate groups – black, brown, red, and oppressed whites – will stand up to
commence a citywide, nonviolent
campaign for living-wage jobs, good public education, economic opportunities,
justice for immigrants, with human and civil rights for all.

The East Wind
Caravan from East LA to Downtown will be focused on building community
empowerment to get people moving into the center of Los Angeles for a strong and
powerful May Day 2012. Starting at Cesar Chavez and Atlantic with a speak-out
at the Steven Rodriguez Peoples’ Memorial to highlight the issue of Police
Brutality, Special Order 1, and the rise of the Police State in this country, we
will then march in procession to vehicles where we will mount our Caravan.

One of our points of unity for calling this General Strike
and Day of Action has been a call for an ending of the Police state in this
country. After this, we will then move on to Obregon Park, set in a residential
neighborhood in close proximity to a high school and elementary school, and a
short way south from CSU Los Angeles and east of ELAC, to hold a rally and
discussion on Education as a human
right. We bring this issue to the front because of the absurdity of
this world in reverse when it spends more on funding prisons than on funding
schools. Education, at all levels, is a human right, and should be treated as
such.

The caravan will continue on to Mariachi
Plaza—set behind White Memorial Hospital—a large non-unionized hospital
suffering cut-backs in Boyle Heights.
Here we will discuss the need to prioritize Healthcare as a human right—in this
land of wealth, it is astronomically immoral that thousands die for lack of
care they have a right to. Next we park our cars, occupy the Metro Gold Line
and head to Union Station and the Historic Placita Olvera to begin our final
march to the convergence on Main Street.

10:00am: Gather at Chavez/Atlantic, Hold speak out and
discussion on police brutality in the community

The North Wind
gets an early start! 7 AM Panorama High School students and Occupy San Fernando Valley members will
be marching to Hermandad Mexicana at 8 AM, where a vegan breakfast will be served to replenish the early marchers, and
get the main force ready for a 9 AM start. The march will proceed up Van Nuys Blvd. to the Van Nuys Civic
Center, where a General Assembly
will be held outside of Congressman Berman’s office. Part of the discussion at the
GA will be focused around what the participants want to take as their next step
on the way to the convergence downtown.

Some participants may want to head over the County
Federation of Labor/Teamsters “American Reclamation” (starts at 11 AM) action
in Glendale before continuing on in
a caravan into Chinatown. The
majority will likely march through Van Nuys, targeting the Worker’s
Compensation building before occupying the Metro by 12:30 PM (Orange Line) at
Van Nuys & Oxnard – and changing to the Red Line at the North Hollywood
Station to meet the East Wind at
1:45 PM at the historic Placita Olvera, where they will march to the
convergence at 6th & Main.

7AM – Panorama High School

8AM-9AM – Hermandad Mexicana (7915 Van Nuys Blvd.)

11AM – Van Nuys Civic Center

12:30PM – Orange Line (Van Nuys & Oxnard)

1:45PM – Placita Olvera

2:30PM – 6th & Main

After a day of actions and outreach that cripples capitalism
in the city, OccupyLos Angeles will be hosting a special General Assembly at 7PM at Pershing Square. We will show those who
‘claim’ power, where the true power
lies — in our dedication to talking with each other and empowering ourselves to
solve our own problems, the problems of the 99%.

Everyone is welcome! Everyone will be heard.

Occupations, individuals, groups, organizations and trade
unions across the nation, seething with righteous outrage at the oppression of
the people as they express their discontent with the deliberate silencing of
all those who oppose the concentration of wealth and power into the hands of
the 1%, have taken this call up in
droves. 60 cities across the nation have called for a People’s General Strike, and pledged to walk out of schools, call
in sick to work, and disrupt the financial system by refusing to participate in
it for one day – May 1st, 2012.
Despite this, the mainstream media has restated its allegiance with the 1% by its silence and deliberate
negligence in covering what promises to be a day of solidarity and unity
between all those who have had enough of suffering injustice and inequality at
the hands of the rich.

Of course, just because this is historic, and because no
living human being has seen an anti-Capitalist mass mobilization of this
magnitude in the United States in their lives, doesn’t mean it’s news. Much
like the fact of having hundreds of occupations in public squares going on at
the same time wasn’t news last fall, this national Occupy event seems a bit ho-hum to the Mainstream Media just 3 days
before May 1.

Without further ado, the list of participating cities as of
4/27 is 115 cities 125 cities and
rising, can be found here.